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Sunday, December 09, 2007

What we're up to

DS7 and DS8 are doing well with their Quran memorisation, alhamdu lillah. And they read on their own every day now, mashaa Allah! Practice makes perfect. With Fajr being so late, now during the winter months, they get a lot of undisturbed reading done in the mornings while their younger siblings are still asleep. They often recite some in the evenings too.The two older boys go to the mosque for Fajr prayers, since about a week back, read a little bit there and then get back home for breakfast and some more Quran. They are starting to get a hang of Idghaam, mashaa Allah.After we're all done with breakfast, we clean up.This is DD2, hoovering, with the new trick we recently learned, to keep the back straight, I must say it makes a big difference for my back, mashaa Allah (JazaahAllah khayr to the sister who gave us the tip).Today I got a quiet moment to go through some surahs with DS5, DD4 and DD2, while the older boys went shopping with their father, alhamdu lillah. Most times I get to hear their Quran is in the middle of cooking or dish washing. I've stopped that with the other two, as they are memorising more complex surahs now. Each of them has a day when they help with cooking. This is DS8 stuffing his chicken with tarragon. And here we have DS7, reading about animals, his favourite topic. In this case the Cheetah. Him and DS5 have been browsing the Arkive site (recommended by Umm Rashid), a lot these last few days, and searched a few animals on Wikipedia. All of them have had their rounds on Starfall, and last week it was the geography games at yourchildlearns, that kept them occupied (also from Umm Rashid).

We are also working on Arabic alphabet books, so today they coloured some pictures to go with Alef. DS8 said that he's not a baby, but opted to have the ready-made pictures anyway. All he did was write his name on it, though. At first he thought an alphabet book was for babies too - I already know the alphabet!, but was happy to cut and paste letters onto coloured paper of his own choice, in the end.On the front-cover of the books I've written the alphabet with glitter glue (except for DD2, who gets a mini version, with glittery letters inside). And for DD4, I'm using a bit bigger letters, that I fill out with glitter glue, so she can trace them with her finger (an idea inspired by Umm Sadiqah's sandpaper letters).For the boys' books I'm using simple outlined letters, to trace and then colour in.